ITS is pleased to announce the addition of Kristi Mercer to our staff. Kristi joins us as Application Analyst for Financial Aid. She brings many years of IT experience to Washburn after working in several roles with the Kansas Department of Revenue. The next time you are passing through Bennett, please stop in Room 100 and welcome Kristi to campus.

ITS has a number of WiFi enhancements underway across our campuses and we continue to work on improving coverage and capacity on our wireless networks. I thought I’d highlight what we’ve done over the last year and what we’re working on for the coming year.

We recently deployed the WUGuest wireless network providing visitors to our campus WiFi service for up to 3 days without requiring any prior authorization on the part of ITS. WUPublic remains unchanged for longer term visitors, students, faculty, and staff. However, in order to reduce confusion between WUPublic and WUGuest, WUPublic will be renamed WUcampus as of August 1st, 2013.

You may also see ITS Networking staff wandering through rooms in your building this Summer and Fall with laptops and possibly other equipment. We’ll be performing a whole-campus survey of wireless coverage so that we can more effectively identify and prioritize areas of poor coverage for improvement.

Work this summer and for the coming school year includes the following enhancements:

New equipment to provide wireless throughout Carnegie Hall (completed in the last week)

New wireless equipment at the Lee Arena gates to support online ticketing and validation (recently completed)

New wireless equipment at the Stadium to support online ticketing and validation (by end of August)

New wireless equipment on Henderson 3rd floor in the Mass Media area (recently completed)

In the last year we’ve performed the following new installations and upgrades:

Last summer we upgraded WiFi in residential living areas so that we had newer technology equipment, more access points, and access points placed closer to where students live and use their computers, mobile devices, and other wireless technologies on a daily basis.

Reallocated old equipment from Residential Living to improve wireless throughout the Memorial Union and Stauffer Commons

Reallocated old equipment from Residential Living to improve wireless in Student Recreation and Wellness Center

Reallocated old equipment from Residential Living to meet greater demand in the Whiting 358A/B classroom

Reallocated old equipment from Residential Living to address problems in the basement of Stoffer

After extensive review of several options for a new streaming server for the campus, the committee has selected Ensemble Video to replace Washburn’s current Helix streaming video server. Ensemble Video will provide an intuitive interface through which campus users will be able to post videos. Other key features of Ensemble will include; mobile device support, HD (High Definition) content delivery, privacy settings, sharing options, and integration with a captioning service to provide ADA compliant content. We have also contracted with Ensemble Video and Desire2Learn to work on a “deeper” integration within the learning management system-Desire2Learn. Thanks to everyone who participated in the selection process by attending presentations and submitting feedback. We look forward to helping you explore the new opportunities that Ensemble Video will offer to the campus and will be working diligently to make the transition to the new streaming server as seamless as possible. Look here for more announcements on the Ensemble Video implementation and migration schedule.